Board members, regular volunteers, and Lake Cowichan School students were overjoyed recently when Erin Richards showed up with a $1,000 cheque from Sunfest’s Laketown Ranch Benevolent Society.
Shelley Davies-Coburn, secretary, DJ, marketing, and fundraising coordinator at Radio Cowichan, was utterly delighted at receiving the $1,000 from the Society as part of the recent Help Us Help Others contest.
“This will pay a lot of bills,” she said, waving the cheque around in the air as friends laughed.
The contest was a great way to interact with the community, Richards said.
“We had lots of entries. We tried to get people to share videos about organizations that are doing really good work and then we would pick a ‘winner’ to donate a thousand dollars to. We’ve decided to donate it to Radio Cowichan. It feels really good to be able to contribute so much locally, really local for us because Laketown Ranch is only minutes away. They work with kids and the station itself does so much to keep the community connected.”
Richards was impressed with what she saw when she visited the Radio Cowichan building, which is part of the Lake Cowichan School complex.
“Part of how we measure our success as a company is by how much we’re able to give back to our community. With the on-going success of Sunfest and the amazing first-year success of Laketown Rock, we’re able to donate throughout the year through the Laketown Ranch Benevolent Society.
“We chose Radio Cowichan for this donation because of their unyielding support of local kids. Their programs teach these kids the technical aspects of broadcasting, as well as instill in them self confidence and self esteem.”
The society’s officials had to decide among quite a few entries (with videos) in their contest but the one from the Radio Station really caught there attention.
According to the radioheads at the station the day we visited, a radio presentation of Orson Wells’ War of the Worlds, altered to have the Martians landing at Laketown Ranch, was a real hit.
In a Facebook post after the presentation, Davies-Coburn said, “This is the best day ever. Our students from Lake Cowichan School and Amanda Nixon, Bryden Danis, Aidan Sidhu, (our student DJs) along with Erika Blume, Don Kitsch, Jean Atkins and moi, won the contest for our video that we sent in to Lake Town Benevolent Society. We are so blessed to have talented students.
“I want thank Erin Richards and Greg Adams for this awesome opportunity.”
It’s simply a place where a wide variety of people can find an interesting outlet for their talents. Listen to the station at 97.5 FM on your radio or cicv.ca or check out the gang’s goings-on Facebook at Radio Cowichan. They’re active in the community.